So this chapter is a little shorter than the previous chapter was. It was origninally supposed to be a filler chapter, but at the end it honestly turned into one of my favorite chapters. This chapter had some of my favorite quotes from everything I've written so far. Enjoy and please review!

Chapter 7:

Hermione peeled her eyes open and only found darkness around her. She was laying in a bed, she knew that much, she just wasn't sure whose bed. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, her mouth felt like it was filled with cotton.

She blinked a few times and looked around the room she was in. She was alone. It took her a few minutes to figure it out, but she recognized the room as one of Harry's spare rooms at Grimmauld place.

She threw the covers off and climbed out of the bed. She was still wearing the clothes from earlier and they had grown quite uncomfortable.

She shuffled out of the room to find she was on the second floor. She realized the room she had just woken up in was the same room that Hermione in the memories woke up in after the attack in Diagon Alley.

She shuttered and headed downstairs.

The house was quiet, but Hermione could hear hushed voices in the kitchen. As she headed down the stairs the voices grew louder.

She noticed she was barefoot as her feet touched the cold wood floor. She headed down the hall and walked past the sitting room. In there Ron laid, passed out on the couch, one arm hanging down and brushing the floor.

Hermione finally entered the kitchen to see Harry and Draco sitting at the kitchen table. They were drinking coffee and seemed to be having a relatively civil conversation. Hermione realized that she was now referring to him as Draco in her head.

When she entered the room both men turned their attention to her.

"Hermione," Harry said standing from his seat. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm fine, Harry," she said smiling a bit at her best friend.

Draco watched her as she made her way over to the table.

"Let me get you some tea," Harry said moving towards the cabinets.

"Thank you, Harry."

Draco cleared his throat. "Are you okay?"

Hermione looked up at him. He seemed genuinely concerned for her well being and she decided to answer honestly. "Depends on what you mean by okay."

Draco simply nodded. "I was-" He stopped.

"Was what?" Hermione pushed.

"You freaked us all out a bit when you passed out earlier."

Hermione chuckled a little, but she wasn't sure what was funny. "I think...I think it was all just a bit much."

Draco nodded. "Yes I suppose."

They sat in silence as Harry returned with Hermione's tea. She nodded in thanks and took a sip. The liquid burned her throat but she kept drinking anyway.

"We need to finish watching the memories," Hermione stated. They needed to finish them. Hermione needed to know what happened

Neither boy said anything, but Hermione knew they agreed with her.

"It's been a long day," Harry said standing from his seat. "I think I'm going to try and get some sleep."

Hermione nodded. "You should. Tomorrow will be just as long."

Harry told them goodnight and then headed to his room, leaving his half full coffee.

Hermione and Draco simply sat there for a long time, drinking their beverages. Hermione didn't find the silence awkward, quite the opposite actually, she found it rather comforting.

"I just don't get it," Draco suddenly blurted.

Hermione furrowed her brows in confusion. "Don't get what?"

"Everything," He huffed. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms behind his head. "If it is Bellatrix that's doing-did, all of this, then why? Why is she doing it?"

"I don't know," Hermione said shaking her head. She wished she could give him answers, he seemed so desperate for them, but she had nothing to say.

"Crazy fucking bitch," he muttered.

Hermione snorted at that, which made Draco smirk. He looked exhausted, not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. Hermione hadn't realized before just how draining this whole day must have been for Draco. Most of the events did involve his family.

"Are you okay Malfoy?" Hermione asked.

He looked up at her. " Depends on what you mean by okay." He smirked a little, but it was filled with sadness.

Hermione wasn't sure what drove her to say it, maybe it was the exhaustion or maybe she had a moment of sanity, but she asked, "What about us?" Draco's eyebrows shot up. "Or them I guess." She shrugged. "Why do you think it happened?"

"Why do I think the intense snogging happened, or why do I think they started to feel that way?"

Hermione's eyes widened a little at his bluntness. When she didn't respond he answered his own question. "The first I'd say because they got horny being stuck in that house all the time." That made Hermione choke on her tea. "The second I guess...well they seemed to have gone through alot together."

Hermione was surprised at his honesty, but she liked it. "That makes sense."

"Yeah," Draco said then paused. "Those memories are making me think about a lot of things."

Hermione wasn't sure what he meant by that, but she didn't push.

"It's getting quite late," Hermione said looking at the clock on the wall. It read 2:30 am. "You should probably get some sleep."

He smirked. "You should too."

"Yeah, I guess I should." She smiled. It was strange, their conversation wasn't uncomfortable, but she felt strange. She looked down at her clothes. "I just wished I had something else to wear.

Draco laughed and muttered, "Bloody hell."

"What?" He was making fun of her but she wasn't sure what for.

He shook his head. "Granger, you're a witch, remember. You can just transfigure it ," he reminded her.

She was confused for a moment, but then she realized her own stupidity and chuckled. "I seemed to have forgotten that."

"Brightest Witch of our age my ass," Draco said. Years ago that comment would have made Hermione furious, but recent events and his slight grin made her laugh instead.

"Okay," she reached across the table and took his mug from his hands, "It's really time we went to bed." She stood from the table with both mugs and placed them in the sink.

"You're right," he said standing from the table. He stood more than head above Hermione, the top of her head reached just above his shoulder. He looked messy, but not in a bad way. His white button down top was untucked from his trousers and the top few buttons were undone. She was sure he had been wearing a tie this morning but that seemed to have been discarded long before. He also had the sleeves of his shirt pushed up to his elbow, which exposed the white bandage that covered his gashes.

"Have you cleaned that since you left the hospital?" Hermione asked gesturing to his arm.

He looked down at it and furrowed his brows. "Oh, I guess I haven't."

"I could, if you wanted." They both seemed equally surprised by what she had said, but he said something equally surprising.

"Um...sure that would be...yes thank you."

She blinked a few times. She hadn't expected him to say yes, she also hadn't expected to offer to clean his wound. She then pulled her self together and walked towards him.

She pulled out her wand and summoned some healing pastes. She placed them on the table and turned her attention back to Draco.

He held out his arm for her and she began to unwrap the white bandage. She never looked up but she could feel him watching her fingers move. When she finished removing the bandage she examined the gashes. They didn't look much better than they had the other day, but they seemed to be healing. The mangled Dark Mark was much more visible now that the wounds had begun to heal.

"I can't believe someone would do this to a person," Hermione said quietly. With one hand she dipped her fingers into the jar of healing paste, with the other hand she held onto his wrist right below where the cuts were, and began to rub it on the wounds. Draco hissed and clenched his fist. She could feel the muscles tighten in his arm.

"I'm sorry," Hermione said, but continued to clean the area. When she finished, Draco released his hand and let out a breath. Hermione cleaned up the healing paste and put a fresh bandage on his arm.

"Thank you," Draco said. Hermione had a feeling that he wasn't just saying thank you to be polite, he was saying it because he meant it.

She nodded at him. "You're welcome." When she said that, she meant it.

There was a moment of awkward silence before Draco cleared his throat. "We really she be getting to bed if we want to get any decent sleep."

She nodded and they began to leave the room, together. "Are you...how did...was it hard for you? The memories?" Hermione said, stumbling over her words a bit. Draco looked at her out of the corner of his eyes, seeming surprised at her difficulty to speak.

He gave her only two words as a response and said nothing more of it. "Yes. Very." Hermione had never seen, The Slytherin Prince, The Malfoy Heir, The King of the World, quite that honest, quite that vulnerable. While she should've been sorry that he hurt because of the memories, something inside her sparked. He was human too. He had empathy and kindness in him, and he was willing to admit that, even if he seemed reluctant to do so. In that moment, in those two little words, Hermione saw a little of the man she had seen in the memories. She saw a little more of Draco and a little less of Malfoy.

They reached Hermione's door in silence, the room he was staying in was one door over. He stopped outside her room and began to speak. "Thank you, for-"

She smiled. "You're welcome." Hermione had assumed that he was thanking her for cleaning his wound, but she later realized she was not sure of what he was thanking her for.

He nodded at her and continued off to his room. Just before he closed his door he shouted out into the hallway. "Goodnight." He then shut his door behind him.

Though he couldn't hear her, Hermione replied with her own goodnight, and then continued into her room. She transfigured the clothes she was wearing into a tee shirt and sweatpants and then climbed into bed.

She laid there thinking about just how confusing Draco Malfoy was to her. Her thoughts continued until she drifted into sleep.

Draco Malfoy felt oddly safe staying in his ex enemy's spare room. He sat at the edge of the bed thinking about the day's events. He had never imagined this is where he would be at the end of the day. In Harry Potter's house, thinking about the odd girl that was Hermione Granger.

He had always hated her and he had never known why. It wasn't until recently, while alone in drunkenness, that Draco realized just how vile he had been to the girl. The night before he had been attacked, he drank himself into a stupor. Blaise was there to watch his realization, to watch him crumble.

He would never tell her, he couldn't. He couldn't tell her and he wasn't sure why. Maybe it was because he didn't understand her. He couldn't fathom why she'd ever forgive him, and she had. She stood up in court, along with Potter, and defended him. He had done horrible things to her. Called her names, threatened her, he let her get tortured in his own home. That room would forever haunt him.

He didn't understand why she would forgive him, and he didn't believe that she had, not until today. When he first started watching the memories, he expected them to hurt for many different reasons, but he was surprised to find that she hurt him the most. He saw today that she had actually forgiven him. He watched her forgive him again. He watched her trust him. And he watched himself spend every second trying to make up for everything he has ever done.

The memories showed that she had forgiven him, but would he ever forgive himself?

Draco discarded his shoes and shirt and climbed into bed, still baffled by the girl that had forgiven him.